Fidel Castro accuses Russia of betraying Cuba

HAVANA -- Fidel Castro said Russia had betrayed Cuba and formed an alliance with the United States when Moscow severed agreements with the communist island after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.

"I do not try to blame any one leader in particular. It was the fruit of its (Russia's) errors and the painful way in which it lost the ideological battle against the western capitalist and imperialist bourgeoisie, under the standard of the United States," Castro said in speech reported by Sunday the Communist Party daily Granma.

"Russia, allied with the United States, broke all the accords and betrayed Cuba," Castro said in the speech delivered Saturday to mark the recent renovation of more than 100 primary secondary schools in Havana.

Cuba still is struggling to recover from the economic crisis triggered by the loss of aid and preferential trade agreements as the Soviet bloc disintegrated a decade ago.